The present invention relates to a device for discriminating and distributing bobbins, which are discharged from an automatic winder or the like, in terms of the quantity of yarn wound on the bobbin and/or kinds of the bobbin.
In order to obtain one fully-wound package at an automatic winder, it is necessary to feed a plurality of cops. The bobbins discharged from the winder are divided into empty ones, which have no yarns wound thereon as a result of the complete winding operation, and yarn-left ones which have failed to be knotted at the winding unit of the winder so that they are discharged while still having their yarns left unwound. The former empty bobbins are returned to a fine spinning frame after a predetermined number of bobbins have been stored, whereas the latter ones are either subjected to a yarn end seeking and removing operation again until they are fed to the winder or handled as the empty ones after their yarns left unwound have been removed.
Furthermore, with a view to realizing a multi-kind and medium- or low-rate production system in a textile finishing field, more and more flexibility is required to give more and more importance to the development of bobbin conveying means for coupling textile machines. In case a variety of yarns are to be finished simultaneously under the above-specified circumstances, it is desired to convey a number of bobbins, which are wound with the respective kinds of yarns, commonly along one passage and to administer the respective bobbins in accordance with their kinds. If that desire is satisfied, it is possible to expect relization of a system which is enabled to facilitate arrangement of the respective machines in a textile factory, to eliminate the stand-by of a machine thereby to improve the working ratio, and to cope flexibly and reliably any change in the production scheme as a whole.